Elsevier

Surfaces and Interfaces

Volume 28, February 2022, 101661
Surfaces and Interfaces

Characteristics of MgO/PCL/PVP antibacterial nanofiber membranes produced by electrospinning technology

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.surfin.2021.101661Get rights and content

Highlights

  • MgO/PCL/PVP (MCV) antibacterial nanofibers were fabricated for the first time.

  • Fiber substrates were prepared by the blend of PCL and PVP with mass ratio of 1: 1.

  • MCV was fabricated by loading MgONPs onto fiber substrates by electrospinning.

  • MCV with 3.0 wt% MgONPs presented great usability and antibacterial property.

Abstract

In this work, the antibacterial nanofibers of MgO/PCL/PVP (MCV) used for tissue engineering materials were prepared using PCL/PVP (CV) as nanofiber substrates and magnesium oxide nanoparticles (MgONPs) as antibacterial agents by electrospinning technology. The suitable CV substrates with excellent microscopic morphology and small average diameter of 208.5 ± 74.9 nm were prepared by electrospinning the mixture of PCL and PVP with the mass ratio of 1: 1. The MCV antibacterial nanofibers were successfully fabricated by loading MgONPs onto the suitable CV substrates by electrospinning process. In addition, the characterizations including scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer (EDS), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and attenuated total reflection fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) indicated that 3.0 wt% MgONPs were physically and evenly loaded onto the CV substrates (MCV-3.0), which presented an excellent antibacterial rate of 100% against Escherichia coli (E. coli).

Introduction

Fabricating the nanofiber membranes by electrospinning technology is a promising strategy in the tissue engineering field [1,2]. The nanofiber membranes exhibit large specific surface area and high porosity due to the small fiber diameter [3,4]. The porous structure of the nanofiber membranes is similar to the collagen structure in the extracellular matrix (ECM), which can be usually used as three dimensional (3D) scaffolds [5]. Thus, the electrospun nanofibers have high research value and application prospect in the field of tissue engineering materials [6].

The polymers of polycaprolactone (PCL) and polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) have been successfully electrospun for tissue engineering materials aiming to develop the replacement tissues of human body [7], [8], [9], [10]. PCL is a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved synthetic polymer, which has tissue compatibility and release mechanism both in vitro and in vivo [11], [12], [13], [14]. Thus, PCL is suitable for making tissue engineering scaffold due to its low autoimmune response and mechanical elasticity [15]. However, the hydrophobicity and slow degradability of PCL hinder its application in medical field that requires rapid absorption rate [16]. Thus, blending hydrophilic polymers into PCL can improve the water diffusion to the proximity of PCL chains and accelerate the hydrolytic cleavage [17], [18], [19]. PVP is a suitable material to blend with PCL owing to its ideal properties such as biocompatibility, excellent solubility in most organic solvents and potential to interact with both hydrophobic and hydrophilic materials [20]. A research paper reported that the addition of PVP can improve the hydrophilic property of PCL nanofiber membranes [21]. However, PCL and PVP with poor antibacterial property can cause serious infections, which may lead to operation failure and secondary surgery [22], [23], [24]. Therefore, it is urgent to endow PCL/PVP nanofibers with excellent antibacterial property.

Several methods have been implemented to endow electrospun nanofibers antibacterial property including antibacterial agents loading [25]. The antibacterial agents of quaternary ammonium compounds and immobilized enzymes have shown limited clinical applicability due to the cytotoxicity [26]. Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are the most widely used nano-antibacterial agents. However, the bacterial resistance and the accumulation in vital organs are inevitable issues for AgNPs [27]. Titanium dioxide and Zinc oxide nanoparticles can also be used for fabricating antibacterial nanofibers. However, the antibacterial mechanism relies on photocatalysis [28,29]. Magnesium oxide nanoparticles (MgONPs) have drawn wide attentions owing to excellent broad-spectrum antibacterial property, nontoxic performance, chemical stability and thermal stability [30]. In addition, MgONPs can exert high-efficiency antibacterial property in the absence of light, and magnesium is necessary for the human body as a trace element [31]. Thus, MgONPs are ideal materials for inhibiting growth of bacteria. The previous study showed that the oxygen vacancies on MgONPs surface can produce strong oxidizing reactive oxygen species (ROS, •O2, H2O2, •OH) by single electron reduction reaction [32]. The ROS can cause a lipid per oxidation of bacteria leading to bacteria's death. Furthermore, MgONPs are relatively cheap, easy to obtain, biocompatible and safe for human beings [33].

Herein, the objective of this research is to obtain MgO/PCL/PVP (MCV) nanofiber membranes with superiorly antibacterial activity that have potential application in the field of medical tissue engineering materials. Firstly, the suitable nanofiber substrates of PCL/PVP (CV) were obtained by regulating the mass ratio of PCL and PVP, which were further analyzed by the characterizations including scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and attenuated total reflection fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR). Then the composite of MCV nanofibers were designed by loading MgONPs antibacterial agents onto the suitable CV substrates by electrospinning technology. The performances of the MCV were characterized by SEM, energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer (EDS), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and ATR-FTIR. At last, the antibacterial property of MCV against Escherichia coli (E. coli) was tested by a shake-flask method, aiming to obtain the nanofiber membranes with the best performance of antibacterial property.

Section snippets

Materials

Polycaprolactone (PCL, 80,000) and polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP, K-30 58,000) purchased from Baoqian Plastic Chemical Material Co., Ltd. and Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co., Ltd. were used to prepare electrospun nanofibers. And 2–2-2-Trifluoroethanol (TFE) purchased from Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co., Ltd. was used as spinning solvents. Magnesium oxide nanoparticles (MgONPs) used as antibacterial agents were purchased from Xuancheng Jingrui New Material Co., Ltd. Escherichia coli (E.coli,

Characterizations of MgONPs antibacterial agents

Fig. 2a shows the particle size distribution of MgONPs antibacterial agents. The particle size distribution is relatively concentrated, showing a normal distribution. Among them, MgONPs with the particle size of 30–35 nm account for the highest proportion, followed by 20–30 nm. The particle size is located within the range of 10–65 nm at nano level, and the average particle size is 30.8 ± 8.5 nm.

The XRD results in Fig. 2b show that all the diffraction peaks of the antibacterial agents are

Conclusions

This research was aiming to prepare the MgO/PCL/PVP (MCV) antibacterial nanofibers using PCL/PVL (CV) as nanofiber substrates and MgONPs as antibacterial agents by electrospinning technology. The CV substrates were prepared with the blend of PCL and PVP as polymers and TEF as solvents by electrospinning technology, and the morphology of the CV nanofiber substrates was studied by regulating the mass ratio of PCL and PVP. The characterization results showed that when the mass ratio of PCL and PVL

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Ying Wang: Conceptualization, Methodology, Resources, Writing – original draft, Supervision, Project administration, Funding acquisition. Yuezhou Liu: . Yongfang Qian: . Lihua Lv: . Xiyue Li: . Yanjing Liu: .

Declaration of Competing Interest

All authors declare that No conflict of interest exists. And we promise that the manuscript has not been before nor submitted to another journal for the consideration of publication. We beg journal office to consider this paper seriously.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Liaoning Province (2019-BS-015) and the Dalian Polytechnic University Youth Research Startup Fund (6102072009).

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